Equifax Breach Advisory

Given the recent announcement regarding the data exposure at Equifax we wanted to share some good “cyber hygiene” and some resources with you. With 143 million U.S. consumers affected it’s a good chance many of us are impacted.

Equifax has said there is no evidence of unauthorized activity in their credit reporting data bases but that there was potentially unauthorized access to information it stored from mid-May to July of this year. That information included social security number (SSN), dates of birth (DOB), addresses and in some cases Driver’s License numbers. Also reported is that approximately 209,000 consumers credit card numbers were exposed as well as other “dispute documents” for 182,000 consumers.

What can you do?

One of the first things typically suggested after a breach is to access credit reporting agencies and request your records to be sure there are no unauthorized accounts or charges. In this case you may want to consider the other agencies, Experian and TransUnion. Also check your online and credit card accounts for suspicious activity.

You can check free credit reports from annualcreditreport.com. Check for any accounts or charges you don't recognize.

Be extra wary of scam emails and links. Avoid clicking on links or downloading attachments from suspicious emails. Equifax will send paper mail to consumers but hackers are sure to use this to conduct Phishing campaigns.

Change your passwords, especially if you have/had an account with Equifax and use similar or the same password elsewhere.

You can check at the Equifax Incident Web Page to get information and to check and see if your records are impacted. You can also access your Equifax credit report here which is probably a good idea so you can compare with the ones you get from Experian and/or TransUnion.